Ireland U18 Men's squad confirmed for FIBA Youth EuroBasket 2025

Three uncapped players have been named in the Ireland U18 Men's FIBA Youth EuroBasket squad, as preparations ramp up for the tournament in Pitesti, Romania from July 25th to August 3rd. Clubs from Antrim, Dublin, Galway, Limerick and Kerry are represented, as well as two players based in the USA and Spain. 

6'6 forward Samuel Emanuel (St. Declan's BC), 16 year-old guard Aivaras Buzas (NABA Lanzarote) and another guard, 17 year-old Jack Fitzpatrick (New Jersey - CAPS High School) will make their first apperances in an Irish shirt during the tournament. 

Three players return from the squad which secured an 11th place finish in 2024. Darragh Horkan (Limerick Lions), Matiss Ogle (St. Declan's BC) and Adam Charles (Éanna BC) all featured in at least seven games in the competition, averaging nine minutes per game between them. 

A further four players make the step straight up from the Ireland U16 squad. Kieran Quinn (Gill St. Bernard's), Mark Burns (Belfast Star), Shareef Elmahi (Dublin Lions) and Nathan Gbinigie (Titans BC) all played vitals roles for that squad, which ultimately finished in 17th place, but lost out some very close games along the way. 

UCD Marian duo Piers Postma and James Power both came through the Basketball Ireland U17 Academy programme and have previously represented Ireland at U16 level.  Both featured for their club in the U18 Men's Billy Coffey National Cup - where they lost out to St. Declan's in the semi-final of the pool stages. 

Speaking on his squad, head coach Niall Berry said:

“I am very proud to announce our final squad of 12 players to represent Ireland at the FIBA U18 Men's Youth EuroBasket this summer in Pitesti, Romania. We deliberated long and hard about players and came to a final squad that we are incredibly excited about. There were some very tough decisions to make this past week with about five or six players really making a case for inclusion and we’ve left behind some players that we would have been very confident bringing with us this summer.

The depth of talent is as always a testament to the increasing standards of coaching in Ireland and the development of opportunities for young Irish basketball players to really work on their game day in and day out. The coaches and clubs and academies in this country should be really proud of the efforts they have put in to develop such talented and hard working young men and our performances at EuroBasket will be a testament to their dedication to these players.

I’m also very excited at the addition of Hillary Nets to our coaching staff. Hillary is a Domino's Women's Super League head coach and known around the country for his coaching pedigree. He, along with Coach Kiv, have given us a lot of value in the last few weeks and I’m excited about our coaching staff's willingness and commitment to supporting for these young men as they look to be successful in European competition.

There are always difficult decisions to make as we hope that the talented young players who didn’t make this squad selection will take the knowledge gained in the last number of month training and apply it to progress towards future international programmes”.

Ireland have been drawn in Group A alongside Great Britain, Iceland, Poland and Bosnia & Herzegovina. Two teams will advance to the quarter-final stage from each of four groups, with three teams gaining promotion to Division 'A' for the following year. 

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Group: 

Group A: Ireland, Iceland, Great Britain, Poland, Bosnia & Herzegovina.

Fixtures:

Ireland v Great Britain, Friday, July 25th, TBC

Poland v Ireland, Saturday, July 26th, TBC

Ireland v Iceland, Sunday, July 27th, TBC

Bosnia & Herzegovina v Ireland, Tuesday, July 29th, TBC 

Ireland squad:

Adam Charles (Éanna BC), Aivaras Buzas (NABA Lanzarote), Darragh Horkan (Limerick Lions), Jack Fitzpatrick (CAPS  High School, New Jersey), James Power (UCD Marian), Kieran Quinn (Gill St. Bernard’s), Mark Burns (Belfast Star), Matiss Ogle (St Declan’s BC), Nathan Gbinigie (Titans BC), Piers Postma (UCD Marian), Samuel Emanuel (St Declan’s BC), Shareef Elmahi (Dublin Lions).